D3hoops.com Daily Dose

Each year we invite a handful of men’s and women’s basketball players to provide us with insight on their season as it unfolds. This year we have a very interesting mix that covers a wide range of the Division III landscape. Let’s meet the second Insider who is setting his sights on playing games into March 2010

Introducing Justin Riley

Welcome to the 2009-2010 season! I am very excited that I have been selected to blog about our season this year. My name is Justin Riley and I am the starting power forward at Chapman University. I am in my junior season and couldn’t be more excited to enter this season with the group of guys we have.

I decided to come to Chapman and play Division III basketball because I wanted to go to a school that would provide me a great education and give me the opportunity to still play basketball. I had the opportunity to play at lower-tier Division I schools, but decided not to follow through because I didn’t think I wanted to play basketball in college and didn’t want to go to an average academic school just to play basketball. Looking back three years later, I would love to have had the opportunity to play Division I basketball, but nevertheless, I have enjoyed my experience at Chapman University.

For those of you who do not know, Chapman University is not apart of a conference and unfortunately we have been stuck as an Independent. As an Independent, it is very difficult to get a bid into the the post-season tournament. Last season, we went 24-3, but had the third “easiest” strength of schedule. We very well should have won one of the games we lost, and looking back, that could have been the game (UDallas) that cost us the post-season bid.

Anytime you are apart of a team that goes 24-3 and end up in the “other receiving votes category” for several weeks, you feel that you deserve the chance to prove yourself on the big stage, but that didn’t happen. I can go on until I am blue in the face arguing that we should have received a bid, but the season is over and there is nothing that is going to change; for that reason, I will let last year end and move on to this season with the hopes of finally getting the chance to play in the post-season tournament.

For the 2009-2010 season, my biggest goal is to earn a post-season bid. As a competitor, I am not satisfied with ending the season short of the post season. I have always wondered what it would be like to play in the tourney at any level, and now that we are knocking on the door, I will not accept anything less. We return all five starters from last years very successful team and have several talented role players that can come and fill any voids. Out of all the previous seasons at Chapman, this is the one year where it is our season to win or lose. All the guys have that bad feeling of what is was like to be so close, therefore all of us our ready to go out and win every game with pride and passion. Besides making it to the post-season, I am striving to earn All West Region honors. The west region is filled with many talented players and I would love to be able to enter the ranks of the top players in the West.

This season has the makings to be a great one and I am excited to see what will happen. I hope everyone will pay attention to us and realize that the Chapman team has the ability to make some noise.

Good luck to all Division III teams this season!

Each year we invite a handful of men’s and women’s basketball players to provide us with insight on their season as it unfolds. This year we have a very interesting mix that covers a wide range of the Division III landscape. Let’s meet the first Insider who would like to finish her season right where it’s starting.

Kicking Off Titan Basketball Season

Hello fans, I am Holly Harvey and I am a junior guard on the Illinois Wesleyan Women’s Basketball Team. Wesleyan is located in Bloomington, IL just down the road from Illinois State University. There are many things about IWU that drew me to the school as a high school senior, such as its great academic reputation, nice campus, strong athletics, and overall positive atmosphere. The women’s basketball program made my college choice easy. The team dynamic was awesome, everyone got along well and I saw myself fitting right in. I stayed to play pick-up with the team and quickly learned that every player had passion for the game, a desire to win, and team mentality. I also found it easy to communicate with Coach Smith and was impressed with some of her coaching strategies that she shared.

I believe that the team characteristics I first noticed on my visit are major reasons for IWU Women’s Basketball’s recent success. Last year we finished with the impressive record of 30-1, however we didn’t reach our ultimate goals of the Final Four and a National Championship. This year is special because Illinois Wesleyan is the host of the Women’s Basketball Final Four. Nothing compares to playing at the Shirk Center in front of the home crowd. Everyone on the team is dreaming of playing in the national championship on our home court and we are working hard to fulfill that goal. However, before we look ahead to the NCAA Tournament, there are other goals that will need to be met before that.

We will be hosting The Tip Off Tournament which includes Washington University, DePauw University, and Central College. We won the tournament last year and are looking for a repeat this year. Following the tournament, we have a more challenging pre-conference schedule than previous years. We are hoping that the tougher competition will prepare us for conference play and the post season. Our goal is to repeat as the College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin champions.

We have been working hard this pre-season to reach our season goals. Our practices have been competitive and we have been improving along the way. We had a scrimmage against Illinois Central College early in the pre-season. We saw a lot of good things at the scrimmage. Our defense looked very solid, especially our 2-3 zone. Offensively we pushed the ball up and got some good looks in transition. We also saw a number of good things from our freshman class.

We just had an exhibition game with Division I 17th ranked DePaul University. Though the outcome did not go as well as planned, as we lost 93-49, I believe it was a tremendous learning experience for the team. We watched film the very next morning and pin pointed some of our weaknesses in the game such as getting open on the wing, defensive rotations, and the transition game. We hit the floor after film and worked on those weaknesses and had a very productive practice. We all agreed that we never wanted to lose by 40 again and put the game behind us. We are now looking forward to starting the season with our first game at home against Blackburn College on November 17th at 7 P.M.

As I was asked to write my final blog I’m thinking to myself, “I can’t believe our season’s over. It went so fast.” As for many teams we wanted to go all the way and get into the NCAAs, but for us that didn’t happen. Even though our season ended earlier then we would have liked, there were a lot of great memories and experience that made this season one of the best for me.

In the beginning of the season we had a slow start and not the best record, but that almost got us motivated and made us work harder, which set the tone for the rest of the season and how we played. After the rough start the team got going and we started to play well and never looked back. It was an exciting season for the team — we were working and meshing well together and playing Edgewood College basketball. One of the great memories for the team was when we went to the Bahamas for our winter tournament. We played well and we won the whole thing. That was the first tournament in my career that we have ever won, so it was very exciting.

For me, this season was one of the best in my career. Being a senior I knew I needed to be a leader for the younger players, this was going to be a learning experience for myself, just as much as it was going to be for them. My teammates were great, worked well everyday together and made playing basketball fun. I loved playing with them all, each one of them taught me something that I will never forget and will cherish every memory from this year. The same is true for the coaching staff. They put so much time and effort to help us become the team we are today. I am thankful for every single one of them and all that they do. They have taught me so much and are the ones that made me the player I am today.

As for me personally I can’t believe my college career is over. It went by so fast and it’s hard for me to know that I won’t wear an Edgewood College jersey again and go and play the game that I love. Even though it’s over for me, I had a lot of great memories and accomplishments that I never knew I would get from playing basketball. All of what I have accomplished individually wouldn’t have been possible without the help of my teammates and coaches, so thank you to you all. You made basketball the best for me here at Edgewood College and I will always remember you all.

Playing basketball here at Edgewood College was the best decision of my life. I not only grew as a player, but as a person as well. I have learned so much and I hope all of my teammates and the other future Eagles experience what I have and enjoy it all.
- Megan Scheele, Edgewood College

WOW, WHAT A WEEKEND! I don’t know where to begin, but I do know that it’s Monday and it is great to still be ALIVE in the “bracket of death”! While most college kids will spend SB09 in Panama City, on a cruise, at home, or at a friend’s grandparent’s house in Naples — we on the Wash U hoops team are glad to be spending the majority of our spring break in the Northwest ‘burbs of Chicago. There’s nothing like playing in the NCAA Tourney, even if it comes at the price of my teammates getting tan (I’ve got nice bronze skin anyway, so who needs a vacation—right???).

When the pairings first came out Monday, I’m not going to lie, I was a little upset with the way the NCAA handled the Midwest and West regions. This is with no disrespect to any of the programs from the East or Northeast, etc. but it was extremely hard trying to explain to friends and family how and why the top seven ranked teams in the country only one could possibly make it to the final four. They’d say, wait so it’d be like if Pitt, UNC, UCONN, Duke and Louisville all were in the same regional—and still not believe me when I said “YES!!!”

After a good hour of pouting about not being able to play at home (since our women hosted) and being sent to the site of one of our two losses all year, we all flipped a switch and stopped feeling sorry for ourselves. I think we realized that when it was game time on Friday against Lawrence, they weren’t going to feel sorry for us so it wouldn’t do us any good to feel sorry for ourselves.

Preparing for Lawrence was really tough because of how well they play together as a team. I think they’re a lot like us. While we felt like our scout team did a good job preparing us, at the beginning of the game it was quickly realized how impossible it was for a scout team to really imitate ‘their stuff’ since they run their motion so well. They read the defense, took advantage of any mistakes we made defensively and made us pay when we didn’t get back in transition. While almost no one our team could hit a shot, luckily we had A.T. on our side.

I don’t know if I can really describe what AT has been able to do for us this season. If you’ve never seen him play–he plays the game the way it’s supposed to be played—at both ends of the court. He’s always been automatic as a spot up shooter—but now he’s a flat out scorer… he leads our team in blocks and even yanked down 10 boards on Saturday. He’s got the longest, gangliest (is that a word?) arms—which is why we say “Go, Go Gadget Arms!” when he gets his hands on balls he has no business getting. Bottom line is that he can hoop!

Anyway, we overcame some miserable shooting from myself and Tyler to somehow sneak away with a win on Friday. As I wrote about last year, the tournament is about surviving and advancing—and that is what we did on Friday. It was one of those games that I really felt like we got out played for 35 minutes or so overall, but thanks to a few good runs, a big time three from A.T., and some timely misses, we marched on to Saturday.

Watching the Elmhurst vs. UW-Whitewater game following ours was unbelievable. I’ve been to Salem the past two years, and that game featured two teams that could have taken down at least half the talent I’ve seen in the Final Four. It’s truly a shame (among a lot of other word selections I could’ve used instead of a shame) that those two played in the first round. It was an awesome atmosphere, it’s just too bad for Elmhurst’s seniors that it had to end like that—because they are a team that deserved to play more than one game in the NCAA Tourney.

With a turnaround of less than 24-hours we had to prepare for our most talented opponent of the year. UW-Whitewater featured some big time athletes inside and on the wings and our coaches did a great job getting a game plan together to help neutralize their athleticism. We jumped out to an early 11-0 lead and played some great basketball. We really frustrated them by doing a few different things defensively and even pushed our lead to 18 in the second half.

As all good teams do, UWW made a big time run midway through the second half. Somehow we held them off and only gave up the lead for 17 seconds on our way to another W. Again, we may have been the better team most of the night, but UWW had chances to win the game. We hit some timely shots, made free-throws and got a little lucky—which is sometimes better than being good this time of year. UWW was the most talented group of individuals, position by position, I’ve seen play at this level in the past four years—without a doubt. Survive and advance.

Looking forward to next week—it should be an incredible game Friday night. Wheaton obviously is a tremendous team and I’m looking forward to playing in a really fun atmosphere. We got to see them earlier in the season when they played at Webster in St. Louis and I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t watched two or three of their games on web cast. Between their threats inside and out—it’ll be a challenge, but one I know we’re up for!

Four more.

Take care,
Sean

P.S. Shout out to my boys Dylan Richter and Tom Blount—two people that have been major contributors on our team that are now out for the year. Dylan broke his foot in the first round game against Lawrence (and then proceeded to NAIL a three-ball before coming out) and Tom is having shoulder surgery this week. It’s no fun sitting on the bench from injury (I’d know from experience) but I know both of these guys are still pulling for us big time. GETCHUUUUUUUUUU SUM.

In his final season with the Amherst basketball team, Ben Kaplan decided to put his writing skills to good use by keeping a running diary of the Lord Jeffs’ 2009 NCAA Tournament experience.

Last April, my fellow members of the Amherst basketball Class of ’09 and I won the lip sync contest, an annual choreography competition with a valuable prize – the first pick in room draw. We successfully made fools of ourselves and won with our skit entitled “Road Trip” with Willie Nelson’s “On the Road Again” recurring as the refrain.

Little did we know that our theme choice for lip sync would also be the theme of our last season of Amherst hoops, perfectly describing the 2008-09 Lord Jeffs. When the schedules were released late last summer, it was clear that the unprecedented seven-game road trip spanning from mid-January to mid-February would define our season.

I can’t help but remember Wilson, the wise neighbor in television’s Home Improvement, once telling Tim “the Toolman” Taylor, face half-hidden by the fence, “When we’re home, we dream of great adventure, and when we’re on great adventures, we dream of home.” There were definitely times during the seven-game trip (which included three games in Maine) that we wished we were back home.

On the fourth game of the trip, we lost to Colby after erasing a double-digit deficit, also losing starter Steve Wheeler to a rolled ankle suffered during a desperation heave at the end of the first half. We then squandered a 19-point lead in the second half of the next game at Rhode Island College, dropping to 3-2 on the trip and jeopardizing our NCAA status.

Our futures remained muddled the rest of the regular season and through the NESCAC Championship, which took our traveling band of basketball players up to Middlebury, Vermont. Every member of our team had had the good fortune of never playing a NESCAC tournament game on the road, so the weekend was a first for all of us, albeit a first that fit perfectly with our season’s theme.

After an emotional win over Williams to take the season series, we lost in the finals against a fired up Middlebury squad and our season hung in the balances. Twenty-one uneasy hours later, we learned we were off of the bubble and into the tournament. In Division I, bubble teams often gather with their teammates to watch the selection show live, cameras monitoring their every move. For us, guys found out this past Monday in a variety of ways – some watched the selection show online, some ducked out of class to “go to the bathroom” and checked the brackets on the nearest computer, and some just waited to hear from a teammate. I figured we had secured a bid when I heard my classmate Glenn Wong running down the halls in our dorm shouting, “WOOOOO!! Let’s GOOOOOO!!!” We had lived to play another day, and we would be playing at another site. The Road Crew would take to the streets once more.

Getting into the tournament excited everyone. Even though this marks Amherst’s 10th straight NCAA appearance, it never gets old for anyone, especially the first-years who were experiencing D3’s “playing house” version of March Madness for the first time. Our draw, however, really excited our coaches, who got the opportunity to bother new coaches for clips they would use to scout new teams. The four teams playing at Richard Stockton College in southern New Jersey span four states and four of the eight regions the NCAA uses to break up men’s basketball teams – Stockton from the Atlantic region; their opponent, RPI, from New York and the East region; our matchup, Gwynedd-Mercy, from Pennsylvania and the Middle Atlantic region; and us from the Northeast region. It is, as Coach Hixon said Monday at practice, “Truly a national tournament.”

Another person who our draw excited was Bob, who has been driving our bus since our last Maine trip nearly a month ago. A jovial man who keeps old Three Stooges episodes running on the bus DVD system after wins, Bob told us before our Williams game last Saturday, “You guys better win. I wanna work tomorrow!” Well, Bob, we got you more work, and plenty of time to continue those conversations with our coaching staff at the front of the bus during the five-plus hour drive to Pomona.

After our long bus ride, which guys spent napping, eating, writing papers, reading, watching movies, listening to music, engaging in conversation, or any combination of those activities, we pulled into the Comfort Inn for a quick stop before our 7:45 p.m. practice. During NCAA Tournament practices, visiting teams get 90 minutes of closed-door court time, which we partook in after Friday’s foe, Gwynedd-Mercy, got in its final tune-up. Our practice consisted of the standard warm-up, shooting and scrimmage as we quickly got acclimated with our new surroundings. In order to succeed as the Road Crew, you have to adapt to new settings quickly, and as the shots started falling with more frequency, it was clear that we had gotten used to the deep shooting background at Stockton’s gym. Hopefully they keep falling for us throughout the weekend.

Our schedule for Friday includes an 11 a.m. brunch, probably at the Denny’s a couple of us enjoyed for dinner (the best part of going to Denny’s with the knowledge you’ll be there the next morning is that it makes the timeless breakfast vs. dinner inner struggle a lot easier to decide). Following brunch, we’ll head to Stockton for a shootaround and a review of the scouting report. It’s the same old away game routine for the team that has made its home on the road this season — just a group of vagabonds trying to keep the journey going, hoping to take this road as far as it goes.